Period

Literature

James Harris was born in Exeter and became a marine artist.
In 1828 he moved to the Mumbles, Swansea and then to London in the mid 1830’s. He met there and is said to have worked with George Chambers Snr. As well as being a painter, Harris is reputed to have been a seaman who had rounded the Horn in copper ore ships. This gave him a superb understanding of the sea and weather.
He exhibited his paintings at the Royal Academy in 1859 and 1862, also at the British Institution and the Royal Society of British Artists.
James lived at the Mumbles and many of his seascapes are of that area. He also spent some time at Swansea harbour where a small group of highly skilled marine artists including James Harris Jnr and Edward Duncan recorded the ships and captured the rigors of life at sea.

Harris’s marine paintings are truly amongst the very finest painted in the 19th Century and his name should be far more widely recognized. His mature works are every bit the match of his former master George Chambers.